Create your audio file — Your podcast can be a “radio”-type show, a spoken political rant, a verbal journal, a music program, whatever you want to record and have listeners hear. You can start out doing something as easy as simply pluging a USB microphone straight into your computer and using a free program such as Audacity for the Mac and Windows, Garageband for the Mac, or any of a number of other free audio programs to record yourself speaking.

Of course, you’ll get much better results with a slightly more sophisticated system — in particular, more powerful software will allow you to easily layer background music with your voiceover, transition from segment to segment in your show, blend together different tracks so you can add sound effects, and more. Garageband will allow you to do those things, or Mackie’s Tracktion is another easy-to-use option. For serious processing power, DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) software such as Cakewalk SONAR, MOTU Digital Performer, Apple Logic, Digidesign Pro Tools and others will give you the same capabilities as the pros have. Music software, such as Propellerhead Reason and Cakewalk Project 5, will let you add your own backing music tracks to bring even more originality to your podcasts.

Stepping up your audio equipment will also help; a better mic, a microphone preamp/processor, effects devices, a mixer, studio speakers and headphones will all help take your podcast to the next level.

Be sure to trim the beginning and end of your podcast with an audio editor so that there’s no “dead” space before your show starts.